I remember the suffocated face as
breath struggled to come through your mouth. The death rattle was quite
distinct. But he resuscitated you or at least tried hard. I knew you were gone
then but my mind wouldn’t accept it. My mind thought this is some trickery,
like a bad tide that will turn over. Then the ambulance came and kept trying!
With CPR and then with the defibrillator. Nothing worked. Your brain was
starved of oxygen for 20 minutes! They finally found a pulse, a faint one. And
then I sat in the front seat of the ambulance and the siren went on! My first,
very personal experience with an Ambulance.
You were rushed to the
resuscitation room. And my anxiety shot the roof! The first thing I thought of
was cancelling our flight tickets. I don’t know why, in that moment, in that
tiny relatives’ waiting room for resus patients, I thought of calling the
airlines to cancel the tickets. Mind has a weird way of handling shock. That
was the first sleepless night at the hospital, followed by many.
The first doctor in the ICU was
very worried for you. He said, the brain has been starved of oxygen for 20
minutes and I am very concerned for her consciousness. I should have taken the
cue from there but didn’t. Your consciousness was lost forever, gone! Later as
I read more about Hypoxic brain injury in aged patients, I failed to find one
positive example of someone who had come back from that. And even if they did
comeback, it wasn’t really a life they wished for. It is a life full of
dependence – something you wouldn’t want. I also read that a brain cell can die
with just under four minutes of lack of oxygen. Those precious moments, the
golden moments of reviving someone quickly from a stroke or cardiac arrest are
so important. CPR is so important!
Within the first hour of your
hospitalisation, a stent was put in place! And we thought, that’s it! You
survived and will forever remain, a heart patient, but will live.
You had a second cardiac arrest,
and we slept at the hospital in the relatives’ accommodation. And after that,
you were stable. For the next one week, I would call every morning, get angry
at him for calling me and keeping the line busy. Because I was your emergency
contact number and needed the line free in case the ICU called. And then, the
MRI report came in. It was confirmed. Your brain damage was beyond repair. I
stopped calling the ICU, I knew I had to be ready for the inevitable. But I
would visit you every day. He would visit you every day. This was his way of
making up for not being there for his father’s death.
For the next three weeks, I clung
to your warm body. The same body that nurtured me and cared for me when it was
able to. I kissed your head, full of your beautiful hair. The ICU nurses loved
your hair and loved braiding it!
When they took you off the
ventilator, I slept in the icy cold ICU room for three nights, no washing, no
bathing. All because I didn’t want to miss the moment, you would go. But you
survived another week! You no longer needed to be in the ICU, so were moved to
a ward, where you suddenly became stable and instantly felt at peace. I could
tell you were at peace because your heart rate was normal and so was your blood
pressure. Your body was happy to be in that ward. It was full of sunlight and
there was a window! I was happy to be there with you. Sleeping together, you on
the bed and me on the camping bed, we got from a friend. I heard your body
snore, and it made me smile. You always snored in your sleep; it was normal to
those who knew you.
I wish I could talk to you about
this experience. The cold ICU, the sleepless nights. The worry, the chaos. You
were sleeping away while chaos surrounded you. There was crying, prayers, video
and phone calls. Arguing with the doctors and the nurses, me and others hanging
by a thread of hope of reviving you. Three weeks of back and forth to the
Hospital. Three weeks of me hoping to see you open your eyes and acknowledging
my presence. Me praying each day and encouraging you to open your eyes. You did
open your eyes, finally, you did! But it was a blank stare in space, you looked
up. Was it death you were looking at? You didn’t acknowledge me or anyone. You
never regained consciousness.
You died in your sleep. The heart
rate reduced from that of a marathon runner to that of someone at rest. Your
pulse dropped and your youngest brother was there. He held your hands as your
body died with the last pulse and all hope of ever reviving you died with it.
But to me, you had died when your consciousness passed away. The same
consciousness that made you love me, care for me that made you, my Mother!
I hate to think that your work
was done. But I don’t blame you for your death, I am not angry with you for
dying. No one wants to die, at least I know you didn’t, just like your mother
didn’t and yet you both did. I don’t want to die, I want to live and yet one
day, I will die as well and so will other people I know or don’t know.
Your death has taught me what
true sadness is, what grief means. I never experienced heaviness on my chest
before, the way I did when you passed away. But I will survive, I know I will,
even if I think I won’t, I will.
We shall never know what happens
after death until our bodies pass through that stage. I will always love you,
Mom, but I am getting tired of the nightmares. Will I forget you, Mother? Did
you forget your, Mother? No, you didn’t. I know that because you kept
remembering her. And I wasn’t there to help you grieve her. I am so sorry to
not understand your pain back then. I am so sorry to not understand your
hormones and pain when you had the hysterectomy! I am so sorry to not be able
to talk to you all the time. To not understand that you needed me and my time.
That you needed a listening ear! I was just busy with my silly life, my job, my
visas and my travels. I didn’t care for you enough and now you are gone. You
don’t have to care for me or worry about me anymore. You are a free soul, doing
whatever it needs to do.
But your death made me worry for
the loved ones around me. Brought me closer to others. Maybe that is what death
does. A constant reminder that it is just around the corner, and you need to
live your life till you can and before death arrives.
During your time at the ICU, I
kept thinking, so many people have passed away while my mother awaits Death.
The fire at the ski resort in Turkey, the American Airlines plane crash with
the military helicopter! All these lives just gone before yours.
I am happy with your death,
because I know it was a beautiful death! It was the kind of death people can
only wish for. Pain-free, conscious free and peaceful! The good care provided
by the doctors and nurses ensured you were peaceful in your death. They didn’t
want you to live a life of dependence – in a vegetative state. That would be
selfish, not thinking about Pramila’s wellbeing! And I remembered your words,
you always wanted to die peacefully! Without knowing, in an eternal sleep. You
never wanted to be dependent on anyone. You finally got the death you wanted,
Mum! And I got what I wanted! To be beside you when you die. Maybe this whole
charade was played for my closure. When I heard your “end-of-life” breathing,
the last night your body was alive, I knew it is a matter of hours or days that
you will be gone. Gone not just in consciousness but in body as well.
I don’t know how to grieve
properly, or in a healthy way. Is there a healthy way to grieve someone? He
says, I wear your clothes all the time. But I wear them because I like them. I
have donated so many! Days are bearable but nights are hard! Help me, move
on...
